Ginsburg Speaks on Women in Law

Fielding questions from Harvard Law School Dean Elena Kagan and an audience made up mostly of Law School alumnae, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg spoke Saturday about women in law and gave insight into her experiences on the nation’s highest court.

Ginsburg came to the Law School as a part of Celebration Fifty-Five, a four-day leadership summit held in honor of the 55th anniversary of female enrollment at the Law School. Ginsburg attended the Law School from 1954 to 1956, then transferred to Columbia Law School for her final year.

Ginsburg began her talk by recounting the struggles of Belva Lockwood, the first woman to argue a case before the Supreme Court and a role model for female attorneys and judges.

“We should appreciate the women on the shoulders of whom we stand—women who said the same thing that we said many years later,” Ginsburg said. “But we said it at a time when society was willing to listen.”

Holding a dog-eared copy of the Constitution, a document which Ginsburg said she carries at all times, she pointed out the attached Declaration of Independence as a treatise showing the country’s respect for “what the rest of the world thought.” But she also suggested that the United States may have forgotten the importance of international opinion, citing a recent New York Times article about the decreased influence of Supreme Court decisions overseas.

“It makes no sense to me that it would be somehow unpatriotic to look beyond our borders for enlightenment,” Ginsburg said. “I have often said, ‘If we don’t listen, we won’t be listened to.’”

Ginsburg also gave the audience an insider’s view of the current Supreme Court, praising the warmth and support of her fellow justices during her fight against cancer.

“As different as we are in the way we approach some very hard questions, the court is a genuinely collegial place—more collegial than any law faculty,” said Ginsburg to laughter and applause. “And we genuinely like and care, not just respect, but care about each other.”

When asked about Justice Antonin Scalia, with whom she has frequently disagreed on legal issues, Ginsburg called him a “wonderful shopper”—alluding to their recent trip to Calcutta—and “very charming.”

“You would not get that from his opinions,” she said.

Alums and attendees found Ginsburg’s candor and insight refreshing, and many lingered afterward to meet the justice.

“She was wonderful to behold, with an impressive memory of case law,” said Susan Carney, who graduated from the Law School in 1977. “She is an inspiration to us all.”

—Staff writer Athena Y. Jiang can be reached at ajiang@fas.harvard.edu.